CANON CITY, Colo., Nov. 2 -- Law officers have captured the second of two convicted killers who escaped from a medium-security prison in Canon City, Colo., four days ago. Police 25 miles away in Pueblo today nabbed Joey Byers, one of two men who cut their way out of the Fremont Correctional Facility.
Byers' fellow inmate, Brian Hood, was captured Wednesday, 20 hours after the escape. Officers say Byers told them he traveled east from the prison to Pueblo on foot. He spent his last night of freedom sleeping in a dumpster near Interstate 25. He offered no resistance and was returned to prison. The 41-year-old Byers, who killed his roommate in 1983 during an argument over a stereo, broke out of the same prison once before and was free for one day. Officials say he likely will be housed in a maximum security prison. The duo used bolt-cutters to break through a double chain-link fence. Prison spokeswoman Liz McDonough says the tool appears to have been buried near the fence for some time. Prison officials do not know where the bolt-cutters came from, nor can they explain why the alarm in the breached section of fence did not work. The escape was not discovered for three hours. Hood, a former Colorado Springs insurance agent, was convicted of second-degree murder in 1991 and sentenced to 22 years behind bars for persuading his mistress, Jennifer Reali, to kill his wife so they could be together. Reali was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison for shooting Dianne Hood as she left a lupus support group meeting. ---
Copyright 1997 by United Press International. All rights reserved. ---
